Tuesday, April 03, 2007

The CCI's Impending Train Wreck

Last week, North Carolina’s public radio station, WUNC, had an hour-long discussion of the Campus Culture Initiative. Though stacked in favor of CCI proponents, the program actually featured a devastating critique of the CCI’s agenda.

Host Frank Stasio opened with CCI chairman Robert Thompson giving the party line: the CCI’s “main thrust was to develop an inclusive social community,” since Duke’s “next challenge is . . . engaging difference.”

Of course, it’s clear that the CCI intended to engage only certain types of difference; after all, CCI subgroup chairs Peter Wood, Karla Holloway, and Anne Allison seemed to have no problem with denouncing students when doing so advanced their personal, ideological, or pedagogical agendas. Those students, it appears, must be sacrificed in the name of the Group of 88’s vision of an “inclusive social community.”

Thompson made clear that the CCI’s goal was weakening the campus position of fraternities and athletes. Why—in the name of inclusiveness—did he not ensure that at least one student-athlete was on the CCI? Stasio didn’t ask, and Thompson didn’t tell.

And why—in the name of common sense—did the dean not demand the resignation of the only fraternity representative on the CCI, senior Chauncey Nartey, after the frat of which Nartey was president was suspended in November? Surely, it would seem, Nartey should not be in a position to tell anyone else how to behave. Could Nartey's retention on the committee have flowed from his having sponsored a late March 2006 resolution demanding that the lacrosse players be forbidden from practicing until Mike Nifong completed his investigation?

Stasio did, however, offer a surprise question. He noted that the report had uncovered evidence that some students and professors engaged in anti-athletic stereotypes. Thompson’s response: “We want to address that situation in its entirety.” How? He didn’t say, and the committee apparently had no interest in pursuing it. For the CCI, it looks like some stereotypes are not a pressing problem.

Thompson, appropriately, called for treating excessive drinking on campus as a “public health problem.” The dean added that the administration needed to “communicate and have clear policies” regarding alcohol use by students. But the CCI head ignored the elephant in the room—the apparent abuse by Durham police of the separate-but-equal policy in which Duke students received disproportionate punishment solely on the basis of their identity as Duke students.

Stasio then discussed the CCI’s “enterprising” recommendations with two Duke students. Student Government president and CCI member Elliot Wolf has publicly criticized the CCI’s flawed procedure. Chronicle columnist Kristin Butler penned an eviscerating review of the CCI. The Chronicle editorial board has penned several articles critiquing the CCI. So, if Stasio wanted, he easily could have found a student to present a critical view of the report. It seems he didn’t want to do so. Both invited students warmly endorsed the CCI.

The program’s most interesting section came in a roundtable discussion featuring Duke grad Steven Roy Goodman, a college counselor with TopColleges.com; Duke law professor Paul Haagen; and anti-lacrosse extremist Orin Starn.

Goodman was a voice of realism in a debate too often characterized by outlandish thinking. “Duke,” he stated, “is playing with fire here.” It “competes in the educational marketplace” with schools like Georgetown, Stanford, and Northwestern (which combine academic with athletic excellence) or lower-tier Ivies such as Cornell and Dartmouth.

Tinkering with its image, Goodman noted, threatens to leave Duke adrift. The CCI’s anti-sports, nanny-state agenda “would dramatically change the way the university is looked at around the country.” And “universities don’t exist in a vacuum.” Students attracted to the current version of Duke would just go elsewhere; students who want to go to anti-sports universities where the administration tells them how to behave wouldn’t necessarily choose Duke anyway.

Goodman astutely analyzed the problem: “The students who are applying to Duke are attracted to Duke precisely because of the athletic/academic combination. And the faculty who are attracted to Duke are attracted to Duke for their own reasons, but those two trains are colliding. That’s what I think we’re seeing now, in the responses to the lacrosse controversy and the responses to this report.” It’s “almost like a house divided—it can’t stand.”

Haagen similarly asked people to live in the reality-based community. While athletes as a whole perform less well in undergraduate institutions, athletes who attend elite institutions like Duke, it seems, “are extraordinarily successful when they go out into the world.” The preparation that they receive, Haagen noted, is highly socially valued.

Speaking, he claimed, on behalf of “many” (unnamed) professors and firmly in support of “our excellent president,” Starn hailed the CCI’s “positive recommendations.” In a comment oozing with condescension, he stated that athletes are “lovely people,” but they were “just getting by in their schoolwork.” (He produced no evidence for this claim.) His support for the CCI’s anti-athletics agenda, Starn fantastically continued, came from talking to (anonymous, of course) student-athletes.

Fifteen years ago, according to Starn, the aura around the Duke athletic program might have helped the institution. But Duke is now a “fabulous university in every respect,” so “we shouldn’t be trying to attract students because of the opportunity they’ll have to be basketball fans.” What should Duke seek? Students attracted by their institution’s “social activism opportunities.”

After a few minutes of listening to Starn, Goodman figured things out: “The issue really is whether Duke is going to be a small school like Swarthmore and promote the kind of social activism that Professor Starn is talking about.” He doubted that it was desirable, or even “possible to have a school like Duke become a school like Swarthmore or Bowdoin.” Duke could be like Harvard or Yale, Starn responded, prompting Goodman to gently remind him, “They have very different historical traditions than Duke does.”

What Starn “is really saying,” Goodman concluded, “is that [athletics] has too much of a place in all of America, and therefore we ought to change America. That may be, but if you’re attracting students from America, something doesn’t make sense here.” But “making sense” was never the CCI’s central goal. As the Chronicle editorialized in January, “Stacking the CCI with critics of ‘white male privilege’ suggests that the initiative was created to pacify countercultural professors, rather than to shape a new and improved campus culture.”

In the end, Goodman reasoned, student-athletes make choices in how they spend their time—just like other students are asked to make choices. “What we see here,” he recognized, “is a campus culture report that’s trying to force Duke to move in a direction of giving students effectively fewer choices.” Figures such as Holloway, Starn, and Thompson want to restrict choices and force-feed Duke students a Group of 88-sanctioned “diversity” agenda. But, to borrow Goodman’s words, the more likely outcome of adopting the CCI recommendations is to set in motion a “train wreck.”

[Update, 11.23am: A reader noted that President Brodhead invited Nartey to be one of two Duke students to accompany him to the Feb. 8 "A Duke Conversation" event in Charlotte. The write-up for the event celebrates, among other items, Nartey's work with his fraternity (which by that point had been suspended). Obviously Nartey is a student who represents the kind of Duke that the administration would like to see in future.]

96 comments:

MTU'76 said...

Duke University Durham, North Carolina, just one train wreck after another.

Thank you Professor Johnson, you scared me again with a true story.

Anonymous said...

Orin Starn is the typical mediocre offspring of college professors who wants to make Duke into the same mediocrity to which he became accustomed growing up.

Berkley-born Starn must have thought he hit pay dirt when he landed a job at an "East Coast" university.

I took several anthropology courses just as electives when I was in school. Because I have some Cherokee ancestry, I wanted to delve into the history of Native Americans before pre-Columbian contact.

Starn spends his waking hours on a topic--cultural anthropology--that one could exhaust in one semester.

He's a drip.

Debrah

Anonymous said...

Their agenda is clear: make Duke an inclusive environment that does NOT include any athletes other than club athletes and that includes as few white males as possible.

Women? Blacks? Hispanics? Gays and lesbians? Bring them all on. Just keep those stinky white men off campus and everything will be lovely and wonderful.

Anonymous said...

Goodman seems to be the only one on the panel who understands that students who go to Duke (like my daughter) really love the school, and they would not feel that way if its personality suddenly changed to follow the CCI. Alumni (like me) feel the same way. So the CCI would alienate your target student market, not to mention those alumni (unlike me) who can afford to provide major financial support. Moreover, there doesn’t seem to be a big demand out there for CCI university, so the only results of the change would be a significant decline in applications as well as in financial support. So the CCI would effectively end Duke’s days as a major national university, and it could simply go back to being a good regional institution. Conclusion: there’s a reason why most of the bozos in the core of the group of 88 can’t make full professor, or why the have degrees from academic hotbeds such as State University of New York at Buffalo (like our favorite thug). The reason is that they are not very bright, so I think we have to wonder why a school like Duke would ever hire them.

Anonymous said...

Something I'd really like to know:

What is Richard Brodhead's true personal opinion of the talent and the intelligence of the Gang of 88?

Is he as dense and blank as they?

I'd like to know how he speaks about them in private.....perhaps when at home talking with Mrs D!ck.

Debrah

Chicago said...

I would bet Starn has never been much of an athlete. It is as if he is saying, "You know, I was never good at sports, so we don't need them here at Duke." Or at minimum, "I do not like college sports, so let's get rid of them."

If this is the rule of thumb, I would like to add I was never good at biology, so I just assume Duke shut down that hospital they have. ;)

Do some of these professors not realize that if it were not for athletics, many Duke students (many of whom are minorities) would not be attending Duke and would never have gotten into a school like Duke. Meanwhile, many have come to Duke and removed themselves from a hostile neighborhood as a result and gone on to both athletic and academic excellence. Sean Dockery comes to mind, his story is a great one, but I assure you with out basketball initially he would not have been admitted to Duke.


Despite everything that has been revealed, I am continually amazed that members of the Group of 88 still feel as if they are the victims in this whole thing.

Anonymous said...

Psssst!

Message to little Orin:

You'd better think that the athletes who attend Duke are "lovely people".

After all, they pay the salaries of little sand scratchers like you.

What a prissy thing to say.

Debrah

Anonymous said...

Debrah,

He may be as blank as his bashful poetry. When I read that he was coming here from Yale, and that he had worked with Bart Giamatti I had high hopes that Duke had hired a decent fellow. But he is no A. Bartlett Giamatti. He is out of his depth and if there was a decent review process in academia, he would be looking for work. But there isn't, and he's not, so regardless of what he is like in person, we are stuck with his vapid wimpy do-nothing public personna. More's the pity.

Anonymous said...

Duke can go to h$$$ in its own basket -

Anonymous said...

Inclusive - means no white men, no Republicans, no conservatives, no capitalists, no one with an IQ above room temperature, no one who is successful, no one who is not willing to be reeducated.

Orwell Roolz!

Anonymous said...

Did Starn really say that Duke athletes "are just getting by" in their school work? Didn't the Duke lacrosse players excel in academics?

Anonymous said...

To give kids an opportunity to go to University, because of their athletic ability is the work of Angels. What person would deny anyone the chance to better themselves? Good luck to them.

AMac said...

Relevant to the CCI's vision or blindness, here is a witty and insightful essay on college admissions by the much appreciated/detested Steve Sailer. Thoughts on College Fool's Day.

Anonymous said...

An alarmingly high percentage of the enablers of this hoax are, what is the word? FAT. No wonder the very existence of serious athletic endeavor makes them un-comfortable.
On the other hand, how should the rest of us want the future to look like? What should be encouraged in this era of fast food and sessile lifestyles? What is the antecdote, afterall, to ending up like (most of the enablers)??
Atheletics taken seriously.

MTU'76 said...

I'd like to see my old school (where nobody cares about humanities - at all!) recruit Starn and Waneema and Karla! I would go back to watch the student/faculty hockey game! They play until the faculty run out men (the walking wounded) to put on the ice. It's the same for the women. I can just see Waneema calling to the ref 'she tripped me! She hit me!' the ref would give Waneema a penalty for delay of game. Even at my age, I think I could lay some lumber on Karla. A little cross checking, because it's almost Easter.

Anonymous said...

But he is no A. Bartlett Giamatti

That's for sure.

When Brodhead was being interviewed by Ed Bradley, I almost felt sorry for him for a moment.

He has no charisma. Like a sheepish choir director looking for his sheet music.

Why Duke hired this loser is a mystery.

(A little trivia: Giamatti's son is the obscure actor with the same last name who played Russell Crowe's trainer in "Cinderella Man".)

:>) Debrah

Anonymous said...

Yep, and his son Paul was in Sideways, too. A trip to IMDb will reveal how well he has done since finishing up at Yale drama school.

But now we are officially off topic - how about them O's? D'oh!

I like the fat comment - that is true of many of the people involved in this hoax - Cash "I like food" Michaels, Rev. "GET IN MY BELLY!" Barber, the various 88 jelly donuts, and so on - not only are they not athletic, they have proven to be violently opposed to those who have any degree of physical prowess. If I was an egghead I might ponder that for a while. Thank goodness I have honest work to do...

Anonymous said...

I would imagine that Chauncey Nartey was retained on the committee not simply because of his resolution to ban Laxers from practicing during Spring 2006 but more importantly because the fraternity he represents is an exclusively African American group, which he earlier described (regarding its difficulties with the national organization) as "a black organization...which thinks of itself as the elite among black males." Am I being paranoid in detecting (among other things) racism, sexism, and elitism here? Perhaps Dean Thompson is one of those who would claim that the movement of the foliage out there closer and closer to the castle is just an optical illusion.

Anonymous said...

The CCI came about in response to a "horrific" incident that in fact never happened. What's the chance that a task force rooted in fantasy and fiction will produce sound recommendations?

Anonymous said...

Does anyone know why Duke hired Professor Starn?

MTU'76 said...

Isn't Chauncey Nartey of the frat where an alleged rape of a Duke coed recently occurred?

The Random Rambler said...

"Speaking, he claimed, on behalf of “many” (unnamed) professors and firmly in support of “our excellent president,” Starn hailed the CCI’s “positive recommendations.” In a comment oozing with condescension, he stated that athletes are “lovely people,” but they were “just getting by in their schoolwork.” (He produced no evidence for this claim.) His support for the CCI’s anti-athletics agenda, Starn fantastically continued, came from talking to (anonymous, of course) student-athletes."

Just a request on an otherwise EXCELLENT post. Please identify the pronouns at the begining of the paragraph. I was not sure right away who you were talking about. You talk about Goodman in the previous paragraph and that is who I thought you were talking about.

Anonymous said...

amac said, at 12:52 AM:

Relevant to the CCI's vision or blindness, here is a witty and insightful essay on college admissions by the much appreciated/detested Steve Sailer.

I think this is the best article on the subject I've yet read (not that I'm an expert). It's so good that I'm going to re-post the URL:

http://www.vdare.com/sailer/070401_fools_day.htm

Anonymous said...

'ThugN$$$$$$$" MARK ANTHONY NEAL IS THE SIZE OF AN ELEPHANT,

Anonymous said...

I am currently a Ph.d. student in the economics department at Duke.

A friend of mine is a beautiful, fun, and very very smart mixed race (her father is black, her mother white) undergrad student on Duke campus.

She often complains to me about the racism she feels on Duke's campus from the black students who literally ostracize her for associating with whites and having white friends. It's getting so bad for her that she is really considering transferring to another university.

She tells me that many of the white kids (like her roommate, from a very wealthy, and truly elite NY family) are "clueless" about the lives of people outside their little socio-economic bubble. For example some of her white friends have expressed surprise that she works a part time job for money, and that she had to buy her own car.

Judging from some of my friend's experiences that she has shared with me, there are serious problems on Duke's campus. There is massive and widespread racism against the white students by many of the black students, and there is indeed an insular, materialistc, priviliged, community of elite white students.

Of course, there are people, both white and black that fit into none of these categories. To the great dismay of all reasonable, open-minded, sincere and genuine people, the "campus culture" movement has been captured by the black racist group. If nothing is done to stop their intended reforms, Duke will certainly be ruined.

When I got here 4 years ago, I was proud to come here. I am much less confident of that feeling today. I fear that in four years I will be positively embarassed that I spent half my twenties here.

Anonymous said...

1:15am MTU'76:

Isn't Chauncey Nartey of the frat where an alleged rape of a Duke coed recently occurred?

Different black fraternity - the alleged rape happened at a party given by Phi Beta Sigma.

Chauncey is in Alpha Phi Alpha.

Anonymous said...

The CCI is Brodhead's monster. He unleashed it on Duke in his panic to appear politically correct as the crusade to crucify his students was gathering pace early on. Of course, we now know that the precipitating cause was a hoax. But Duke will pay nonetheless, as there are too many interests and agendas behind this beast, and Brodhead is on their side. Yet another reason to flush Brodhead out, and the CCI with him.

Anonymous said...

2:46--

What you say is sad but not surprising. It is good that this case has exposed just how far advanced these trends now are at Duke (and not only Duke). It is obvious that the Alums and parents have been far too complacent about their cherished institution, which has been changing under the "leadership" of Keohane and Brodhead. Now there is virtual civil war between the constituent elements. Those graduates and parents who are shocked by this now, and lament it, share some responsibility for not stopping it--to the extent that it could have been stopped. It is obvious that it will continue, as long as Brodhead is at the helm (and in the pocket of campus radicals--to mix my metaphors).

Anonymous said...

The minute I saw that National Public Radio carried this program, I knew without reading that the CCI would be painted with bright and shining colors. My rule of thumb regarding NPR: if the station plays nothing but classical music, it's ok; if it carries the usual panoply of neo-Marxist, radical left-wing propaganda, I turn it off.

Anonymous said...

Judging from some of my friend's experiences that she has shared with me, there are serious problems on Duke's campus. There is massive and widespread racism against the white students by many of the black students, and there is indeed an insular, materialistc, priviliged, community of elite white students.

I 100% agree. This was my experience in college, as well. My kids seem shocked that neither my parents nor anyone else ever paid a penny for my cars (ever) or for my college. But yes, the blacks hate us (lower-class whites) and the upper-class whites hate us, too. They are allies of a sort.

Anonymous said...

DU75 says:

This article is another reminder that advocates of the CCI, as it has been conceived and developed, exist in a parallel universe, one that does not include the great majority of the actively engaged undergraduate student body at Duke.
It has become increasingly apparent that the tenured faculty G88 (Professors Starn, Wood, Holloway, and their like-minded colleagues) pass through their academic lives in a bubble, talking and agreeing among themselves, but totally detached from the pulse and life of the mainstream campus.
The reaction of the undergraduate community to the CCI report confirms that disconnect.
To a large degree, the future of Duke University will be determined by whether that point of view prevails in setting school policy going forward.

Anonymous said...

The GPA of the current Duke lacrosse team is 3.35, earned while they essentially have full-time jobs as lacrosse players (which is simply the life of any elite-level D I athlete.) Chauncey Nartney is the student who sent an email threatening Coach Pressler's daughters, about which Duke did absolutely nothing.

Anonymous said...

Duke grad and parent of future applicant:

My child just visited Vanderbilt where the administration and students embrace athletics. Their national reputation is rising at a meteoric rate, because I would argue they embrace athletics along with their academic mission. (They did slip up in hiring Houston Baker I will note). And Vandy has no problem with fraternities and sororities.

Comparing Vandy with Duke I would note they have departed with maintaining a separate athletic department and they field significantly fewer varsity sports.

I would suggest the middle ground for duke is to deemphasize the size of the athletic program by reducing the number of sports fielded and to dispense with the athletic department. Then leave the vestiges of fraternity and sorority life alone.

Anonymous said...

The assertion that athletes are just getting by is good.
It's good because everybody knows the Duke laxers are outstanding students.
Which means everybody knows the CCI is lying like a rug.
Good own-goal, guys

Anonymous said...

Mr. Goodman is correct. The academic/athletic combination is exactly the reason my daughter selected Duke. As he suggested, Duke is one of the few colleges in the country that truly fit into that category. It is no surprise my daughter's top three choices were Duke, Stanford, and Georgetown.
My daughter had the opportunity to attend Yale, Harvard, etc., but preferred the unique academic/athletic combo found at Duke. I don't understand Mr. Starn's goal of making Duke into Yale. There are already numerous schools with high academic standards, but very few have been able to accomplish what Duke has done. Why on earth would Duke wish to destroy the very concept that distinguishes it from so many other universities?
My daughter has been working on her registration for the fall term. She pointed out that several professors now state at the end of the class synopsis that their class meets the diversity requirement. It was my understanding that this requirement has not yet been approved. Am I incorrect? My daughter couldn't recall all the classes that added this sentence, but specifically recalled Holloway and Lubiano as two of the professors that have made such additions.

Anonymous said...

Duke's athletic department needs to take on this fight, It's just unbelievable how the cancer is spreading.

panda

Anonymous said...

Debrah et. al.:

"Some are destined to toil in the vineyard."

"Brodhead is no Giammatti" is quite the understatement. But please keep in mind that it goes further: he is also no Levin nor even a Schmidt! What has he been--what is he really? He is Second Fiddle.

As a destined Second Fiddle, a position of relative safety from which a relatively small man (i.e., relative to what is needed in a university president) can wield his personal power, basking in the reflected glow of actual authority.

Dick got sick of being second. Duke bought Dick's delusion and gave him the grandeur. The depth of the mistake was revealed almost immediately by Brodhead's bungling of his first crisis--and he threw his students under the bus!

As a Yalie let me say: thanks for taking him off our hands--there was really no other way to off the awful oaf. (And, in all seriousness, my deepest sympathies that payment fell to the innocent lacrosse players.)

Good luck in unseating him, though: he didn't hold onto second place for all those years out of luck--he knows on which side his bread is buttered, and CCI butt-err is to his liking...

Anonymous said...

Your daughter is not telling you the truth. That statement about "diversity requirement" at the end of classes does not exist in fact, in pretend, in anything but other than your daughter's imagination. This is baloney. But I bet a bunch of y'all pick up on this and beat it into the ground even if it is, like a bunch of this stuff here, concocted out of your wish that this is factual rather than pretend. Let's have a reality check.
Whoops, that would be asking you people for too much.

Anonymous said...

9:21

Wahneema - is that you? Your writing has improved greatly - you can now spell "y'all". Congratulations.

Anonymous said...

I have it on very good authority that Starn cheats (a lot) at golf.

Anonymous said...

Why should an academically better qualified applicant be denied a place at Duke so that it can admit someone less well qualified academically but possessing some other attribute that is academically irrelevant? I'm not referring to race; I'm referring to sports. The Gang of 88 would never ask that question, for obvious reasons. But then neither would athletes and their parents. They all seem united on this, at the expense of the academically better qualified.

Anonymous said...

9:21-

Watch your mouth with that "you people" stuff. Don't you know that smacks of prejudice? ;)

Racial hostility across black and white lines is a problem on all campuses. I would like to see Duke take some measures to boost integration, since as an old line (as opposed to modern) liberal I believe that greater integration will lessen misunderstanding and hostility.

Boosting integration need have nothing to do with deemphasiing athletics. As many have said very few colleges try to be top notch at both academics and athletics and Duke's excellence at that combination is only topped by Stanford.

I hope those in the Duke community, particularly alumni and students love their university enough to fight for it. Just assuming the CCI recommendations will be swept under a rug or put high on a shelf in the upper stacks is a recipe (to mix metaphors) for leaving it to the activists who want to alter Duke radically.

Anonymous said...

2:46AM wrote:
~snip~
Judging from some of my friend's experiences that she has shared with me, there are serious problems on Duke's campus. There is massive and widespread racism against the white students by many of the black students, and there is indeed an insular, materialistc, priviliged, community of elite white students.
~snip~

Wow. Kinda sounds like the real world, from which no one can transfer.

Anonymous said...

Duke 09 parent.

Very well said. One of the best places where we see interation working is in athletics!

Anonymous said...

Nice post, 9:04. Brodhead must go. He is a mediocre man, and a moral coward. He should be considered an embarassment to all Duke alumni and not much good can happen as long as he's around.

I hope Duke trustees and alumni will gather themselves, take stock of the situation, and decide to fight to preserve our culture.

In the meantime, my sons will look elsewhere when considering university.

There are too many nasty people on Duke's campus and they appear to be feeling emboldened and powerful these days, largely due to the cancerous nature of Brodhead's tenure.

sic semper tyrannis

Anonymous said...

My son also chose Duke because of the academic/athletic combination. Interestingly, he's not particularly athletic, but when we visited Duke on a warm, spring day, the place was teeming with energy. The campus was filled with healthy, vibrant, active young people who were driven in more than just one area. The contrast between Duke and Harvard was dramatic. My non-athletic son now regularly plays tennis, raquetball, and touch football with his friends at Duke. It's clear that he loves living a balanced life, unlike some of the Fatsos of 88. And boy, he sure does like Duke basketball.

E-mail: said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
MTU'76 said...

9:47 Anon said:
...Wow. Kinda sounds like the real world, from which no one can transfer.

...unless they transfer to San Francisco...

Anonymous said...

"It has become increasingly apparent that the tenured faculty G88 (Professors Starn, Wood, Holloway, and their like-minded colleagues) pass through their academic lives in a bubble, talking and agreeing among themselves, but totally detached from the pulse and life of the mainstream campus."

Unfortunately, the situation is much more serious than that. These folks are totally detatched from mainstream society. It seems that they are increasingly detatched from any form of realtity based understanding of the world they live in. Bloggers like KC Johnson have done an outstanding job of pointing to the situation at Duke, but it should come as no surprise that this sort of intellectual thuggery has been going on for well over fifteen years, and is well documented in books like _The Shadow University._ The real question is: when will the grown-ups start voting, and put a stop to this tax-payer funded foolishness? Or the alumni stand up to these goons and stop writing checks to enable this kind of dubious education? It is long past time to end all the required classes that support campus culture initiatives that are as one-sided and intellectually closed as this one. CCI has made plenty of air time. But it is scarecely the first, or the only one of these brave new worlds on campus.

Anonymous said...

KC,

YOU know why Chauncey Nartey was not suspended from the CCI committee.

HE'S BLACK!

NO ONE FROM THE IFC WAS ASKED TO BE ON THE COMMITTEE. The IFC represents ALL frats, EXCEPT, the BLACK Frats.

Kemp

Anonymous said...

Athletics, like affirmative action and legacies, "demeans" any institution striving for excellence.

Anyone know what the average SAT scores of the recently admitted are? Curious because there was a record number of black and Hispanic applications. Perhaps that had something to do with the low number of applications to the engineering school?

E-mail: said...

Speaking of alumni contributions, does anyone know if these funds are decreasing?

Gary Packwood said...

Duke is Attempting to Re-Brand Itself into an International School

Trickery is the only term I can think of that would describe what Duke is trying to do with their re-branding efforts.

After listening to the WUNC radio broadcast, reviewing K.C.'s chronicle and time line, I can see now that Duke was trying last year to create a crisis with the Lacrosse team and then use that crisis to re-brand Duke as an International University.

The University of Denver is a good model to study.

The University of Denver, Office of Internationalization
http://www.du.edu/intl/

The re-branding would bring students to campus from foreign countries where sexism and racism are serious problems. The Middle East comes to mind along with India, Brazil and Africa.

The popular book by Azar Nafisi. Reading Lolita in Tehran is the academic underpinning of the need for educational opportunities for young women, especially. Young women from other countries.

Students from these countries would be self sustaining as their families would represent the economic privileged and the students would be able to graduate into Duke's Law or Medicine or Business Schools. The Duke Fuqua School of Business has extensive International programming now and would be a natural place for foreign students to learn about International business.

The United States welcomes foreign citizens who come to the U.S. to study.
US Department of State
http://travel.state.gov/visa/temp/types/types_1270.html

This re-branding effort is extensive; modeled by consultants and is characterized by many creative efforts to collect information e.g. The Laxuality Blog Site yesterday that was discovered yesterday (which is apparently gone today).

The administration of Duke had determined apparently that campus athletics is the only barrier to this re-branding effort.

Duke is going to establish a public health type "Surveillance Program" for alcohol related 'problems' and that move will by itself...change the campus culture quickly as everyone is going to have a problem to report.

I am in complete agreement with Blogger CHICAGO when he asked the question several days ago, where is Coach K and the other leaders of campus athletics.

Why not tell the truth? Why sneak around and try and pull the plug on athletics.

If Duke wants an office of Internationalization, just say so. Allow the alums and students to comment.
GP

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Anonymous said...

Some folks have been dumping on Brodhead, which he deserves up to a point, but let's step back a bit. Duke as an institution has to contain this problem, even if some of the administrators are partially responsible for making it worse. If you fire Brodhead all you do is highlight the problem and make it worse still. So like it or not, the institution needs for him to survive for at least a couple of years. Of course that also means that he has to bury the CCI since nobody outside of a small group of professors is interested in it. If there is any question about what his reaction to the CCI would be we can look at some numbers. According to the Admissions Office, Duke is among the second five schools in the country, along with Dartmouth, Columbia, Penn, and Brown. About 50% of students who are also admitted to these schools choose Duke. We do not compete with the top five (Harvard, Yale, Princeton, MIT, and Stanford) since only 15% of those students choose Duke. We are clearly superior to the third five (Georgetown, Chicago, Wash U, Cornell, and Northwestern) since 80% of those students choose Duke. Brodhead knows that his job depends on the school's standing in this very competitive environment, so he cannot make the CCI changes because it would make students less interested in attending Duke. Does anyone really think that the students who apply to Duke are also interested in Haverford? Both are great schools, but the campus environment is totally different. So Brodhead must keep Duke being Duke, at least for a while, and then I hope he goes back to teaching English. Maybe he can go to Vanderbilt and have an office next to Houston Baker.

Here are the numbers:

http://www.dukemagazine.duke.edu/dukemag/issues/010206/crop2.html

Unknown said...

A comment on Gary Packwood's post at 10:42 asking where Coach K is on all this. I was at the Blue-White game back in November, and before the game Coach K introduced the members of the 1986 Final Four team that was on campus for their 20th anniversary reunion (including Johnny Dawkins and Jay Bilas). He said to the crowd (including President Brodhead), "There is no university like Duke University in the whole world." I belive those are precise quotes, and he said it very slowly and very deliberately. Then he went on to explain that this is because Duke combines academic and athletic excellence in a way no other university can duplicate. While he was speaking to the crowd there is no question that he was also sending a message to the president, which I hope he got.

Anonymous said...

Coach G, are you listening???

I cannot believe that that feckless idiot head of the g88 is still around. Steele must have one hell of a lot of power over the board.

Trinity60

E-mail: said...

anon, another incredible cover-up (Nartsey). If I ever commit a crime, I wanna turn black first.

Gary Packwood, that sounds familiar ... my daughter got her graduate degree from an international business school, formerly known as the Thunderbird Institute, located in Arizona. Supposedly, it ranks among the best.

Anonymous said...

Re 8:06 AM--I suspect your daughter was confused by this listing in the description of one of Karla Holloway's classes: "Can be counted as 1860--Present course for the diversified study requirement." This has nothing to do with "diversity"; instead,it's a requirement in the English major that students select at least one course from each of four different literary periods (pre-1500, 1500-1660, 1660-1860, and 1860-present). --A reminder that we all need to be sure we understand the facts before we make a lot of assumptions.

On your other point, however, we are in agreement. Goodman is saying what most of us in the Duke parent community already know--that our children chose Duke because of the Duke "brand"--which involves combining big-time academics with big-time athletics, and which welcomes the "well-rounded" students who fit better there than at schools like Harvard that choose a "well-rounded student body" of students who are exceptional at one or two things rather than balanced, well-rounded students. Though neither of my children applied to Harvard and I can't say whether they would have been admitted (though the older is now at Harvard Law School), both chose Duke for these very reasons.

The truth is, financial considerations aside (for those needing financial aid, the packages they can negotiate at particular schools will obviously make a difference), people who have a choice of going to Harvard or Duke will not choose Duke unless they are drawn to the very things that make it different from Harvard. Orin Starn's quixotic and wrong-headed idea of making Duke more like Harvard would produce a perennial also-ran.

For that matter, if you want to change the brand emphasis, why not at least focus on things you have to sell. Based on my impressions through my kids (classes of 2004 and 2008), social activism is not a particular strength of Duke likely to draw applicants interested in being activists. On the other hand, there are reasonably strong community service and service learning programs in place, emphasizing hands-on community work rather than organizing or political posturing, that could be developed and emphasized. Pre-med is another obvious draw for Duke with the presence of a strong medical center. And a wide range of Duke-administered study abroad and focused study off-campus (in New York or LA, for example) programs also offer interesting options without the need to get a lot of transfer credit approvals. It's interesting that Starn apparently doesn't emphasize these in his vision of the Duke "community."

JohnAnnArbor said...

My sister went to a small division III school and won multiple varsity letters. She also helped start a sorority. She was careful not to wear any sign of her athletic or sorority activities to class because it was well known that some professors had powerful biases against athletes, the Greek system, or both.

And that's at a little school.

Anonymous said...

Here's a satirical offering. Mikey and the lacrosse case are mentioned.

LIS!

Larry Elder


Debrah

Anonymous said...

Getting the black vote


LIS!


Debrah

Anonymous said...

johnannarbor--

[I'm anon 11:06 am]

Similarly, my Duke 2004 daughter felt the need to downplay or hide her sorority membership in a few classes--and once she actually dropped a class because the prof's mistrust of nicely dressed young women with blonde hair seemed so obvious. Occasionally these prejudices seemed specifically to have a political basis; more often they were primarily intellectual--starting from the stereotype that Greeks (and blondes) are not intellectual.

My class of 2008 daughter hasn't really experienced this, I don't think, which may be partly because she has taken different classes, and partly because she maintains a little lower profile generally (and when she does speak up she is usually one of the more politically liberal voices in the room). Or maybe it's just because she's not a blonde.

On another point--how do people know that Chauncey Nartey is the person who sent the e-mail to Coach Pressler? If this is truly confirmed, it's quite disturbing; if it's a rumor, however, it's potentially a very damaging and libelous one.

And what, if anything, do we know about why the fraternity was suspended from its national? (The recent incident at, I think, DePauw involving a national sorority's apparent concern [facts are disputed] that local chapter members weren't thin enough or attractive enough to meet its standards suggests that we might want to exercise caution about the implications of this suspension without knowing more.)

Anonymous said...

Based on what I read here, looks the CCI crowd wants to turn Duke into "Puke".

Brodhead should be fired if this group of radicals continue to reign without strong, divergent voices being heard to fend off this vast, left-wing conspiracy.

The "let's destroy America's traditions" crowd is hard at work here trying to undermine everything we stand for. Way to go, President _ _ _ _head, and all of this as a result of an escort's lies. Only in Durham...hopefully!

Unknown said...

KC

I read this valuable post every day, and I am confused by this article. Who was actually on the panel? It wasn't everyone listed in the article, was it? What did they say?

It seems the article may be hearkening back to issues discussed previously.

Gary

Anonymous said...

Re: Chicago at 12:35

'I would bet Starn has never been much of an athlete. It is as if he is saying, "You know, I was never good at sports, so we don't need them here at Duke." Or at minimum, "I do not like college sports, so let's get rid of them."'


It is my understanding that Starn was on the golf team in college.

The Random Rambler said...

Some of the anti-athletic feelings on this comment thread absolutely scare me. Athletics is the key to getting alumni donations and to get your name out there with potential students.

After George Mason made the final four, suprise suprise, the number of alumni calling to money, applications, and web site hits sky rocketed.

After Gonzaga made the elite 8 in 1999, CBS said during the tournament the following year that applicants and web site hits where way up at the remote Washington university.

Alumni give 25 mil just for winning a football bowl game.

I graduated from a college in Ohio. In our comnference is Mount Union college, which anyone who follows sports knows because they are a D 3 football powerhouse. Since they started down the road to being good, their endowment and and students have both doubled.

There are numerous people who decide to not go to my undergraduate institution simply because they dont have a rec center.

Duke went from a highly known regional university to more on the national stage in the mid-80's, which coincides with the basketball team doing well nationally and the soccer team's NCAA championship in 1986.

The single most important recruiter for a university: The sports information director.

The Random Rambler said...

Ohh, I also have read many scholar athlete of the month articles on the Ohio Athletic Conference web site and have even written one for my undergraduate school.

In a lot, there is quotes that more or less say "I do best academically IN season because I dont have as much time and I know I have to get homework done when I have the time."

Anonymous said...

A quick FYI on Chauncey, who lived down the hall from me freshman year. Though I am not great friends with him, and he joined a black fraternity while I joined an IFC one, I have had numerous interactions with him in the last 4 years on panels and around campus. I have always found him to be an extremely respectful and caring person. As a young man born in Liberia, he often brings an interesting perspective, which probably contributed to his selection for the Charlotte trip and the CCI (and were probably more important than his fraternity affiliation, since they didn't seem to care about any other fraternities. On a side note, numerous IFC members have gone with Brodhead on his "Conversation" trips). He is particularly involved in Common Ground, a Fall Break retreat aiming to create understanding between people of different races.
In regards to the suspension of his fraternity, it was suspended by the national organization for violation of national policies, but remains recognized by Duke because it (as far as I can gather - http://media.www.dukechronicle.com/media/storage/paper884/news/2006/11/14/News/Alpha.Phi.Alpha.Suspended-2458227.shtml) did not violate any Duke policies.
Additionally, I consider the comment about a supposed e-mail to Coach Pressler nothing short of slander. There does not appear to be any evidence of that rumor anywhere else on the internet, and it would be quite out of character for him to do such a thing.
Duke recently did bios for the Duke website for a number of students. Here is Chauncey's - http://www.dukenews.duke.edu/2006/11/nartey.html

Anonymous said...

to Matthew:

The posts to which you refer as being "anti-athlete" are not necessarily so. It's just that most athletes, like most affirmative action recipients, would never have been admitted to places like Duke without standards being lowered.

Duke jocks rarely contribute anything extraordinary in the real world--in that way they are exactly like affirmative action recipients.

Ever wonder why Duke jocks become lawyers and investment bankers? These jobs are not cognitively demanding.

Gary Packwood said...

Matthew 1:22 said ...The single most important recruiter for a university: The sports information director.

I just wanted to showcase your comment on the SI (Sports Information Director).

You are absolutely correct and I have been wondering why I have not been reading anything about the Duke SI and his or her involvement with the CCI.

You graduated from a truly wonderful place with a long line of scholar athletes. Congratulations.

GP [B-W here](:-))

Anonymous said...

Duke '07--
Thanks for the update on Chauncey, and for a post which affirms the concern I raised earlier when I asked about the basis for the claim about the e-mail to Coach Pressler. Surely the people who post on this board, even more than most, should hesitate to conduct anonymous and unsupported character assassination of anyone.

I also think your point that the fraternity suspended by its national is still recognized by Duke suggests caution is appropriate in drawing conclusions from that about anyone's behavior or character. I would hate to see us (i.e., those who support the lacrosse players and criticize those whose judgments have been based on stereotypes, unsupported conclusions, and "meta-narratives" without regard to the actual facts) commit the very type of sins we deplore.

Gary Packwood said...

Ricardo 10:54

You quoted Coach K

"There is no university like Duke University in the whole world." I belive those are precise quotes, and he said it very slowly and very deliberately. Then he went on to explain that this is because Duke combines academic and athletic excellence in a way no other university can duplicate. While he was speaking to the crowd there is no question that he was also sending a message to the president, which I hope he got.

::
That is a wonderful thing for the Coach to say ...and very old school.

Today he needs to be at the table with the decision makers at Duke and be part of the consensus building process.

Women faculty today pay very little attention to the rousing speech from the playing field.

And besides the Alums tend to make a lot of 'Give One for the Gipper' type noise which turns out to be, more heat than light.

Suppose any of those supporters are going to come through with their wallets to support Duke athletics?

GP

Anonymous said...

Anon at 10:01 AM said: "My son also chose Duke because of the academic/athletic combination. Interestingly, he's not particularly athletic, but when we visited Duke on a warm, spring day, the place was teeming with energy. The campus was filled with healthy, vibrant, active young people who were driven in more than just one area. The contrast between Duke and Harvard was dramatic. My non-athletic son now regularly plays tennis, raquetball, and touch football with his friends at Duke. It's clear that he loves living a balanced life, unlike some of the Fatsos of 88. And boy, he sure does like Duke basketball."


My son's initial visit to the Duke campus was almost identical to that described above. It was a beautiful spring day and the energy emanating from the variety of groups of students was amazing and, after his brief visit to Duke, he lost all interest in Yale, Northwestern, another college that offered him a partial merit scholarship, and the university he could attend for free where his father works. To him, these campuses paled in contrast, and for reasons right or wrong, he chose Duke and we, his parents, figured it best to let him make the decision on where to spend four years. In hindsight-- the only way to know that the right choice of college was made-- he had made a great choice.

He had his opportunity to become a Greek there, and chose not to, but enjoyed the company of Greeks throughout his four years. A wannabe athlete, he had his opportunity to try a team sport, crew, and found he couldn't continue getting up to attend early morning practices, but enjoyed sports and the company of athletes throughout his four years. He was a middle-class kid, but enjoyed the company of both very wealthy and scholarship students. He mingled with serious academic students and with those who just wanted to have fun. He has an on-going invitation to visit his student friends from Turkey. He loved the "work hard, play hard" ethic that is often used to describe Duke. He played a little too hard (in the opinion of his far-away parents) his first year and a half, then did a turn-around to become a serious, but still fun-loving student, thanks in part to a tough-love thermodynamics professor, who didn't care a whit about the "culture" of his students but did care that they master the subject matter of the courses he taught. He maintains close ties with many of the students he befriended at Duke, a diverse group, although they live miles away.

Figuring our kid was a goof-off and we were forking out way too much money for him to have such a good time, we were pleasantly surprised at how he grew intellectually at Duke. The Duke "brand" worked for him, and he has just passed his orals in very competitive engineering program and on his way to receiving a PhD in a subject that the likes of the 88 could never master.

He is the type of undergraduate student the CCI seem to want to abolish. He learned a lot of ways to imbibe alcohol there, and now he doesn't drink at all. The 88 and CCI vision of an ideal student population would be that manifested in the photos of the dour potbangers and vocal pseudo-intellectual victims out to transform the world into their own vision of utopia.

I'm tired of the press and air time these CCI types are getting, which is one reason I enjoy this blog so much as a counter to their bloviating. There are so many good professors at Duke, who are truly interested in teaching students, not transforming them into little simulacrums of themselves. I feel sorry for those students who fall under the pernicious spell of the "victimized" professors. They will wear the mantle of victimhood for the rest of their lives, if they don't wake up.

Thank you, Debrah, for providing more background on Orin Starn, the privileged, pretentious scholar of fine pedigree and meager academic output of substance.

Anonymous said...

What is this "e'mail" that Chauncey Nartley (or someone) sent to Coach Pressler (or his daughters)? Anyone have a link to the text?

Anonymous said...

In a DSG policy statement drafted by Nartey, he suggested that the administration "prohibit the team from participating in any practices until the current (lacrosse) investigation has been settled." Does anyone know what the final DSG resolution looked like?
Also, is there any truth to the allegation that Nartey sent Coach Pressler an offensive email?

I wonder how the students on the CCI Steering Committee were selected. It doesn't look like a very representative group to me.

Anonymous said...

CCI is akin to a revolutionary movement's effort to endlessly "purify" its surroundings by refining away the "base elements" that do not "believe." The CCI rejects "inclusion" and insists on a campus amde only for itself and true believers.

The grief imposed by Nifong on those poor kids may at least have one benefit aside from the end of Nifong's reign as DA: the outing of the CCI and the group of 88 which was operating almost invisibly in their cubicles and quiet offices. They have been pulled out for inspection into the sunlight for all to see. The alumni must be appalled. And not just at Duke where my daughter did not apply.

In college in the 60's, I initially saw jocks as buffoons living an extended high school. I came to appreciate the balance they added as it became clear their alcohol-fueled existence served as a very necessary counterbalance to the core of effete professors, instructors and administrators who would otherwise have strangled us all with nonsense like CCI.

I would have rather done without the jocks and the frats but it was clear they gave me a needed buffer. Antibodies if you will, to the proliferation of annoying "studies" professors who insist on meddling in everyone else's life. And as between the two groups, the noisy, drunken, buffoons never imposed on me like the professors with an agenda did. An interesting leson to me then and now about the utility of those buffoons.

Anonymous said...

http://abcnews.go.com/Sports/wireStory?id=3004705

Basketball Coach Leaving for Texas

DesertBunny said...

Thompson, appropriately, called for treating excessive drinking on campus as a “public health problem.”

KC,

Why would you call a social problem a public health problem? Is it contagious?

Anonymous said...

re academic mediocrity of the lacrosse team

It's common knowledge at Duke that the low-IQ lacrosse players love black studies courses.

Nothing else needs to be said.

affirmative action professors and lacrosse--perrrrrrrrfect together!

Anonymous said...

Why is there affirmative action at Duke?

I thought we were all equal.

Perhaps that's not true, but we're afraid to admit it.

Sad.

Anonymous said...

CCI Train Wreck

The train wreck, in reality, is the eventual end of affirmative action a k a race norming. CCI is just another ruse used to convince whitey that he is responsible for the pitiful condition that is the black race. From the sub-Sahara to Karla Holloway, there is not much reason to believe that blacks can compete against whites and Asians in any cognitively related occupation. So, what is the CCI?

Just another "initiative" to promote antiwhite bigotry. So boring--so pathetic.

Gary Packwood said...

libertewoods 4:47 said...

...Why would you call a social problem [drinking] a public health problem? Is it contagious?

There is a branch of Public Health which is referred to as Epidemiology.

An Epidemiology and Surveillance Program works to prevent, seek out, monitor and control disease outbreaks and epidemics in the community.

The ...AND EPIDEMICS part of that ...is what he was talking about.

They will set up a Surveillance Program and track every incident of alcohol related problems on and off campus.

And there is a connection between substance abuse and sexual assault.

You can bet that each time a student that belong to a group gets into trouble over drinking the Dean's office will know via that Surveillance Program the last time a similar student was in trouble from that group; where it happened, the outcome of the case, gender and Zip Code.

This is not especially good news.

Amazing what money will buy.

GP

Anonymous said...

Ever wonder why Duke jocks become lawyers and investment bankers? These jobs are not cognitively demanding.

Kirk Osborn would beg to differ with you.

Anonymous said...

Some more great, ncisive and insightful posts by Debrah, Locomotive Breath, and Cedarford (3:00 PM). If NPR would include them in the panel disscussions on the hoax and student culture and national TV stations would hire them as talking heads along with the resident experts, the radio and TV audiences and ratings might increase. I'd love to see Debrah, LB, and Cedarford pitted against the leadership of the 88 and CCI. It would be like watching a Division I team play against a Division three team, and further expose the CCI crowd as the nitwits they are.

E-mail: said...

4:00 said: "...In college in the 60's, I initially saw jocks as buffoons living an extended high school. I came to appreciate the balance they added as it became clear their alcohol-fueled existence served as a very necessary counterbalance, etc ..."

That puts you in my age bracket, and I clearly remember the jocks being referred to as, you said, "buffoons".

By referring to their "alcohol-fueled existence", do you mean their behavior was perfectly okay since it represented some sort of "balance"? From your recollections, what else did their behavior include. Certainly nothing like sexual assault, rape, and/or drugs?

Anonymous said...

A few years ago, I heard someone say they wanted "a government that looks like America!" I thought, "I'd like an NBA that 'looks like America'", and to that end, I'm proposing the following simple affirmative action program:

Starting in high school all black players must wear 2-pound ankle-weights; whites must wear 1-pounders. In college and the NBA, we will need to adjust these weights, probably to at least 4- and 2-pounds, respectively. Anyway, the exact poundage can be determined later; the important thing is to provide a level-playing field (or basketball court) for Asians and Hispanics who have traditionally been excluded from the NBA except in the most token numbers.

E-mail: said...

rrhamilton, oh puhleeeze, not the race thing again. If you're "black or hispanic", you've already got an EDGE. What exactly is it that so-called "minorities" are looking for? what do they WANT?

Little story: back in the mid sixties, school integration began. Mind you, that's over 40 years ago! Okay, so the initial years, give or take 15 years, don't count.

Nowadays, the minorities are "the majority" and they have every educational opportunity available to them. Why is it that they STILL cannot pronounce the word "ASK"

Anonymous said...

Georgia Girl - you can't even spell correctly, so to correct someone's pronounciation of English is a bit much.

Also, this blog is not about your rape. I know you think it is, but it's not.

Please try to stay on topic.

DesertBunny said...

Dear Gary

Thanks for your response at DIW.


you said:

"An Epidemiology and Surveillance Program works to prevent, seek out, monitor and control disease outbreaks and epidemics in the community."

I agree, not especially good news.

My name is Art Thomas, by the way. I live near Charlottesville,Va.

I was being sarcastic with my second question. I had forgotten how parts of the medical profession like psychiatry is turning purposeful human behavior into a medical event as opposed to a moral one, where one chooses to rape or take one more drink that seriously impairs his judgment. I'm not convinced at all of the disease model of human behavior. And I base that on a reflection on my own inner life over several decades, and the arguments of Thomas Szasz that mental illness is not medical illness but a metaphor for behavior that others find offensive, but behavior that is often self-destructive and destructive of others.

One could argue that the Group of 88 have mental illnesses, diseases of the brain, that prevents them from grasping and acknowledging the truth about themselves that other see. Maybe because they are wordsmiths and have status, their critics accord them the dignity of being human by suggesting that their problem is a moral one.

I imagine they wouldn't be too keen if they were treated like students who drink too much and have their poor judgement and bad behavior in this case turned into a disease to be monitored and controlled.

Anyone, student or otherwise, sober or excessively drunk with an ounce or more of dignity ought to be offended by this insidiously cynical view of human behavior, good intentions not withstanding.

E-mail: said...

9:07, I'm tired of dodging you. You're like a gorilla with a sledgehammer. Does it really make any sense for an "intellect" like yourself to constantly badger a harmless lady. Admittedly, I have little light to shed on the problems of the world, or Duke. If I like to ramble, so what?

The fact that I'm a 300 pound kook with a wart on the end of my nose should not matter to you at all. Try to think of me as "rich" from a long line of republicans. And, with that vision in mind, perhaps you can tolerate my insignificant posts?

Seriously, I understand the pain, hurt and anger you have experienced as a result of the scandal. However, I believe these emotions were present prior to the incident, prior to KC's column, and prior to my posts.

I recognize the signs because I've been there. And I still have to fight it!

If you want to dump on me, that's fine for the short term. But in the long run, nobody, except YOU, can fix the hate and the anger within. Sonner or later, you've got to DEAL with those emotions!

Anonymous said...

Ga grl - this sonner of which you speak - just what the heck is that? Is that like "ask" a word that some cannot pronounce?

E-mail: said...

Is spelling "really" the issue?

Like I said in so many words, dumping on me might loosen your albatross, but it won't work in the long run.

Cut me some slack?
Thanks
This sick conversation is over.

MTU'76 said...

Anonymous @ 9:07 said...
Georgia Girl - you can't even spell correctly, so to correct someone's pronounciation of English is a bit much.Also, this blog is not about your rape. I know you think it is, but it's not.Please try to stay on topic.

I don't think 9:07's spelling is flawlwss, but as a magna cum whiskey where I came from, a university that had no real use for English teachers, I really don't care about spelling. I care about science. I also care about the non-rape Duke case. Rape is so rare in our society and/or so hushed up that I would think the people on this board would feel enlightened to have a rape victim's POV . I'm not saying we rapees need to find therapy on this board, I'm saying the milk of human kindness can run thin here.

Gary Packwood said...

Mr. Thomas 9:33

Thanks.

My entire extended family here has a friend who is an elderly physician. Age 92.

You would enjoy meeting him and he... you.

We tease him a little and ask if little Jonathan's pet turtle is covered under Blue-Cross.

The good Doctor put his finger to his lips and says HUSH. Don't even ask that question as the little turtle and its families genetic code will surly be covered by Blue Cross and studied under a federal grant.

He then goes on to tell us that when the Steel Mills in Pittsburgh and Youngstown started 'with the' health insurance ...everything became a health care problem.

He is a good guy. The kids love him.

There are Epidemiologists who study wars as epidemics just to annoy George Bush and the VP.

As a former fraternity advisor I used the old sermon'ett with the guys about the various ways they could assault themselves with a stupid stick...and you can't drink all the beer in town ...so don't try.

Guess that does not work anymore.

Anonymous said...

The problem with your writing is it's just as slanted as the people you are describing:

[Haagen]: "While athletes as a whole perform less well in undergraduate institutions, athletes who attend elite institutions like Duke, it seems, 'are extraordinarily successful when they go out into the world.'

[Starn]: In a comment oozing with condescension, he stated that athletes are “lovely people,” but they were “just getting by in their schoolwork.” (He produced no evidence for this claim.)"

Nor did Haagen provide proof for the athlete's alleged success in the real world. You seem only concerned with proof-less propositions when they are anti-lacrosse.

Show some professionalism.